Miscarriage Of Justice (23 page)

He could have gotten a little sleep, but after all the excitement, he didn’t think he’d be able to rest. Call it fear, nerves, or just plain old common sense; his mind was far too preoccupied to permit sleep. That was okay; it wasn’t like he had nothing to do. The rest of the furniture projects would keep him awake. And of course, there was the knowledge that a dead body was just outside the door. That should be enough to keep anyone awake.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Mariana was uneasy and couldn’t sleep. Worn out and exhausted from a hard day at work and dealing with her frazzled nerves, she’d gone to bed a few minutes after ten the night before. Shortly after five o’clock on Thursday morning, something had awakened her rather abruptly. She tried to call Jessi, but there was no answer. Stubbornly, she lay there, still trying to get her beauty rest. Glancing at the clock again, for the umpteenth time, did little to help. It was six thirty. This had lasted over an hour and a half. Still not sure what was keeping her tossing and turning, at twenty minutes ’til seven, she decided to get up.

Checking that the doors were still locked, she eyed the alarm. With a sigh of relief she saw it was armed and there was no indication of it having been tripped. Yet, something had roused her out of a deep sleep. And why did she have the distinct feeling she wasn’t alone? Looking blankly out the window, she saw no vehicles in the drive, no signs that anything was amiss. Wandering room to room, she found nothing out of place, yet the feeling persisted.

The sun was starting to break over the eastern horizon, and yawning she looked again at the clock. Still needing to get ready for work, but remembering Ethan’s last visit, she was a little reluctant to get in the shower feeling the way she did. It was strange, in the twenty years since she’d moved out of her parents’ home and lived alone, this was the first time she could remember experiencing the awkward sensation. And she didn’t even know why. There was just a strong anxiety, a nagging awareness that something wasn’t right. But, try as she may, she could find nothing wrong.

Dialing Jessi’s number again, Mariana waited, listening to the sound of herself breathing on the phone.
Why doesn’t she pick up?
It finally occurred to her to call the hospital, thinking maybe Jessi had been called in for an emergency or something.

The receptionist who answered the phone said she didn’t know if the nurse was on duty or not, but offered to page her. A few seconds later, an out-of-breath Jessi came on the line. Hearing Mariana’s voice, she gushed, “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Mariana said. “I’m not sure anything is actually. I just feel really weird. I was sound asleep and then about five o’clock, something woke me up. I haven’t been able to get back to sleep since.”

“Maybe it’s your conscience,” Jessi half jokingly suggested.

Mariana didn’t answer.

Breaking the silence, Jessi asked if she had checked the house. Mariana assured her friend she had, numerous times, and had found nothing.

“It’s probably just your nerves,” Jessi said. “With everything you’ve been through lately, I’m surprised you’ve lasted this long.”

“Are you saying I’m crazy?” Mariana asked seriously.

“No, of course not,” Jessi said. “I just...”

“I know,” Mariana said. “But I’ve never had a problem with nerves before. I’m a lawyer, remember? We don’t have nerves.”

“I think you’ve got a lot of nerve,” Jessi said pointedly.

Ignoring the comment, Mariana asked, “What are you doing at work already?”

“I got called in at one o’clock this morning,” Jessi explained. “The night shift nurse didn’t show up because she didn’t have a way to get to work, so here I am.”

“Oh, well, I’ll let you go then,” Mariana said. “So you can get back to work. I just needed to hear a friendly voice.”

“Call me later. When you get home. Or better yet, at lunch.” Jessi told her.

“Won’t you be sleeping?”

“No. Well, maybe.” Jessi said. “Call me anyway.”

Hanging up the phone, Mariana didn’t feel much better. Sitting at the table, drinking a cup of coffee she’d warmed up in the microwave, she desperately tried to identify the source of her vexation. Was it Ethan? She didn’t think so. Nothing had really changed with him. In fact, the last couple of days, she hadn’t even heard from him.

“Maybe he’s dead,” she said hopefully. Then it hit her. “That could be it! Maybe through all of this we were cosmically connected and my psyche knew the moment he was no longer among the living.”

She frowned at her own crazed logic. Was that really possible? She decided it probably wasn’t. Unless...

Unless Jessi had been right, yet again. Maybe her conscience was trying to tell her something. She did admittedly feel a little guilty. Not enough to change anything, but a small twinge of guilt lingered just the same. She had continually put it out of her mind until she hardly noticed it anymore.

On the other hand, maybe she hadn’t. Maybe it had been festering in there in the dark recesses of her mind, waiting for the right moment to make itself known. Perhaps it was all catching up with her. “Or, maybe I really am finally going crazy,” she muttered aloud. “And maybe I’m already there. Here I am again, talking to myself.”

Glancing at the clock on the stove, she blinked in surprise. It was seven thirty! She had to be to work in half an hour!

Forgetting the uneasy feeling, she hurriedly took a shower and got dressed. Grabbing a file folder off her desk, she set the burglar alarm, locked the door and fired up her Corvette.

Relaxing on the short drive, she sensed the jittery feeling worming its way back in. Ignoring it didn’t seem to help. Neither did concentrating on it. The harder she tried to put it out of her mind the stronger it became. Something was definitely out of whack. It wasn’t just her conscience, or her mind playing tricks. The feeling was real. She just couldn’t put her finger on it.

Knowing she didn’t have court that day was a relief. In her current state of mind, she’d be completely worthless. Parking the car, she hurried into the office; still trying to shake the persistent nagging that plagued her. All morning she dealt with the distraction. In a daze, her mind disengaged, she didn’t get much work done. Mostly, she spent her time sitting at her desk, lost in thought.

Frankie hadn’t said he’d let her know when the job was done, and she considered taking a drive to see him, but then thought better of it. Surely, he’d find a way to get in touch with her. The mob kingpin couldn’t resist bragging a little, she thought. It just wasn’t in his nature.

Lunch hour came and Mariana looked pensively at the phone. Should she call Jessi? After working all night, her friend was probably sound asleep; still she’d insisted Mariana call. But with nothing new to report, there wasn’t much point in calling yet. Since it would serve no purpose, she decided against it. “She’ll call me when she wakes up,” Mariana said to herself.

“Who will call?”

Startled, Mariana looked up. Miss Gooten was giving her a questioning frown. “A friend of mine,” she said. Thinking fast, she added, “We’re supposed to be planning a party for her son’s birthday.”
This talking to myself has to stop
.

“How old is he?” Rachael asked.

“Who?”

The secretary gave her another puzzled frown. “Your friend’s son,” she prompted.

“Oh,” Mariana gulped. Recovering quickly she said, “He’s nine, or will be nine next week.”

Satisfied, Miss Gooten nodded and disappeared, thankfully not pressing the issue by posing more questions.

As predicted, a few minutes past two o’clock, Jessi was calling Mariana’s cell phone. Closing her office door, Mariana pressed the talk button. Without waiting for a friendly hello, the sleepy sounding nurse set right in. “I thought you were going to call me?”

“I know,” Mariana apologetically began. “But, there wasn’t anything new to tell you, so I decided to just wait.”

“You had me scared,” Jessi railed.

“Sorry. But really, I’m fine.” It seemed that had become her mantra in recent weeks.

“Like I’m supposed to believe that,” Jessi said. “Who was it that couldn’t sleep last night?”

“I just had a strange feeling someone was in the house, but there wasn’t anyone there,” Mariana passed it off.

“Do you want me to come down?”

“Nah,” Mariana said. “You have to work.”

“I’ll take a few days vacation.”

“No. I’m okay. In fact, I haven’t heard anything from Ethan for the last few days. I was thinking of going to visit Frankie Arimante. He probably has some news for me.”

“You hope,” Jessi said. Then she brought up a possibility Mariana hadn’t considered. “What if this Ethan guy set up a way for the pictures to be delivered to, say a newspaper, or TV station if he were to die? Then what are you going to do?”

Mariana sighed and after a short pause said, “I don’t know. I hadn’t thought of that.”

“It wouldn’t be that difficult you know,” Jessi went on. “It happens all the time in the movies.”

Letting out a deep breath, Mariana knew that once again, her friend was right. “This isn’t the movies, and I don’t think he is that smart, but I suppose it could happen. If it does, I guess I’ll have to deal with it. At least I won’t have a crazy man on the loose, constantly calling and otherwise harassing me,” she pointed out.

“No, you’ll have a thousand female inmates harassing you, some of whom you put in the place. They’ll be making your life miserable while you sit there helplessly, in prison.”

“Well, you sure know how to cheer up a person,” Mariana said dryly.

“You really shouldn’t need me to tell you this. You are the District Attorney,” Jessi reminded her.

“Maybe I will go to see Frankie after work,” Mariana said suddenly. “And tell him to just forget it, if he hasn’t already, well, you know.”

“It might be too late for that,” Jessi said. “I don’t mean because Ethan’s already dead either. But your friend, Mr. Arimante, might tell you the deal can’t be undone. I’ve heard that once you make a contract with guys like that, you can’t renege.”

“Well, I guess I’ll find out,” Mariana said.

“Call me and let me know,” Jessi said, yawning. “And this time, actually call.”

“I will,” Mariana promised.

“Bye.”

Mariana stared at the phone long after she’d hung up. Why couldn’t things be simple? Instead, life became more complicated, almost on a daily basis. She looked at the clock and sighed. Time just seemed to make things worse. Except where Ethan was concerned. Time for him had made things better; he’d gotten out of prison.

Shaking her head, Mariana mumbled to herself, “I should have just gone for the death penalty sixteen years ago. Then I wouldn’t be in this predicament.”

But, none of that could be changed and that was a problem. A big problem. Wearily, she organized some of the clutter on her desk. In an hour or so, maybe she could try to straighten out some of this mess.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Don’t fall asleep on the job! That was the lesson Ethan had learned. The night before, while working on the endless pile of furniture, he’d fallen asleep amid the mess of tools and piles of boards. He’d awakened with a start at four-thirty in the morning, cursing himself for not staying awake and alert. He was glad no one had come to make another attempt on shooting him—that was a good way to wake up dead!

Four-thirty! He’d planned to be gone by that time, well on his way to Mariana’s. He’d wanted to arrive at the house while she was still asleep and leave the body of the man he killed in her car. The stunt would most definitely make for a chilling and gruesome discovery when she set out to go to work that morning.

But that would take time, and thanks to not staying awake, he was running out of time. The trip to the District Attorney’s house would take at least twenty minutes. Then, unloading the body, transferring it to her car, and propping it up in the driver’s seat would eat up another half hour or so. That didn’t leave much time to get away without being discovered. And that he surely wanted to do.

He let out a depressed sigh. The day would be dawning shortly before six and he wasn’t sure what time Mariana would be getting up. Yet, he stubbornly still wanted to try it. With any luck, he could pull it off. All he had to do was work fast—and quietly. He crossed his fingers, and hoped Mariana wasn’t a light sleeper.

Arriving just before five o’clock, Ethan parked on the road, a short distance from the house, and walked the rest of the way to the drive. To his relief, no lights were on inside. It appeared the high and mighty D.A. was still asleep. But he had to be sure before he attempted the reckless act of depositing a corpse in her car while she was home.

As he eased up to her bedroom window, he could see the outline of the woman’s body lying on the bed. Ethan felt his heart pounding faster, realizing she was still sleeping. Maybe this was still a possibility!

The clock on her dresser read two minutes until five, and he decided to wait for a few minutes at the window, just in case she had her alarm set for five o’clock. If it wasn’t, he should have until five-thirty to high tail it back to his car and get the body transferred to her vehicle.

Then something, he still wasn’t sure what, gave way under his foot. Not much, but enough. Off balance, his head fell forward, banging hard into the window with a loud thud. Instantly, he saw Mariana jump, and then sit straight up. Dropping quickly to the ground, Ethan slithered along the wall to the backside of the house, frantically searching for a place to hide in the brightly illuminated yard.

The only place to offer sanctity was the small shed he’d hidden in before, but it was over twenty feet away on the other side of the open drive. Without taking time to wonder if he should chance it, he hurried across the well-lit lawn and the exposed area of the driveway. Swinging the shed door open, he scampered inside, quickly pulling it shut behind him.

And there he stayed until Mariana left for work, all the while wondering if she would discover his car, with the body in the trunk. But, he thought, breathing a little easier, at least he’d parked on the side away from town and the car should be out of sight from the normal traffic on the road. So, maybe she wouldn’t see it.